rover1.5dx

Yes. Well over 20 years ago. Lots of walleye, some jumbo perch. I remember fishing was fantastic when storm fronts would move in. I think we average about 15 eyes per person/day.

Trout season closes September 31st in Algonquin. Brookies will come to the surface in certain locations and certain times in June but being on shore you'll be very lucky to come across such a situation. As mentioned there's no motorboat rentals in the Park. The reality is that it's a canoeing destination so if you're not comfortable in a canoe it's not a very good destination. The thing to consider is that June is primetime for bugs in the Park. Good luck in your quest. Perhaps look to a lake further to the south that rents boats.

Most name brand vises are very capable for tying flies. Two brands that stand out are Renzetti and Dyna-King. I own a Ron Abbey Signature of the later. Well above $100 but tying flies is supposed to be an enjoyable time so why not tie on a beautifully made vise. For $145 the Renzetti Traveller Rotary is hard to beat. I highly advise a rotary vise as it can help a lot for many types of flies and tying techniques. Also in that price category is the Peak Vise which has been mentioned. A couple of my buddies have them and enjoy them. If you win the lottery consider a LAW (if you can find one), and/or Renzetti Master.

Actually I already have a canoe and all the gear. Have spent over 150 days in Algonquin, worked in Quetico and paddled rivers in Quebec, BC, NWT and Nunavut and caught some amazing fish (cutties, grayling, arctic char, etc)...been there and will continue to do that... ...but my next chapter in life may entail being a little more sedate and making the mrs. happy... Keep the suggestions coming. Thanks!

Just dreaming of a day when I might have the time and money for a cottage. Wondering what the best cottage lake in either the Muskoka or Haliburton district would be? Criteria: 1) multi-species including lake trout, brook trout, walleye, bass, muskie or pike, and an assortment of panfish (yes, I know very few lakes have a combo of cold and warm water species). 2) quieter lake 3) clean water 4) good cottage association 5) money no object 6) within 2.5 hr of GTA Thoughts?

D'uh. Sorry, yes, you're correct Bass are out of season. Silly me. Brain fart as I don't usually lake and gear fish. Target will be walleye and panfish. Thanks.

Hi Everyone, My company is having a summer event for the day at Viamede Resort. A good portion of the group wants to try their luck fishing out of some pontoon boats. Myself and a buddy will rent a fishing boat and be a little more serious. I'm not looking for your hotspot...just looking for general fishing ideas and/or areas close to Viamede Resort. We're putting on a friendly fishing competition and everything is catch and release. People are just interested in action so bass, walley and panfish are the target. No live bait. Question: any suggestions for types of structure to look for? It's supposed to be sunny and hot this Friday so I was thinking bass might be the best species to target in the day and walleye early in the morning... Should we focus on weed edges? Deep drop-offs? etc... I'll be bringing my Lowrance X67c portable and I have a handheld GPS with Navionics hydrographic chart map for Stony. Thanks in advance, Rover

Sweet! Was it buggy? By the looks of it you had it pretty good? I've done the Coppermine and Nahanni and both were quite buggy...especially the upper Coppermine and lower Nahanni. Any other trips coming up?

Sweet! How was the fishing? I've paddled the Coppermine and Nahanni. The former the fishing was out of this world amazing for Artic Char...

I bought a Clam 5600 last year (bigger version of the 2000). Way too heavy and impossible to pull by hand with anything more then 2" of snow. After two frustrating outings I sold it and bought an Ice Cube. Way lighter and more portable. I bought a separate sled and pulled it out that way. Much roomier than a 2000 or 5600. Yes, it can be a challenge setting up in the wind but with two it's no problem. Without 40km winds it will setup in 30 seconds by one person. Taking down takes me about 4 minutes. I did have one day where the side flaps froze to the ice but that's more a function of the weather. Same can happen on flip over portables that have the same flaps. Just be careful to use dry snow and keep water away. Worst case use a portable heater to melt them loose. One issue is securing the ice anchors. In clear ice it can be difficult getting the screws started. A drill would help or just be patient and push very hard while turning. There's a reason why Clam, Eskimo and all the established portable hut makers are now offering the cube style huts. THEY'RE POPULAR AND RELATIVELY CHEAP!!! I also have a Schappel Rover 1.5DX. Great one person (2 in a pinch) flipover style hut. However I'm intrigued by the new giant 2 man Denali huts by Clam.

I did a special one-day all-inclusive bonefishing (on the fly) trip with Pesca Maya Lodge. They come and pick you up from you hotel and drop you off. It's about 2 hours south on Ascenscion Bay. World-class bonefishing and the lodge is top rate with guides who do everything from tying your leaders to spotting the bones and permit (and maybe tarpon). Lunch included and you go out in 18 foot pangas with 50hp motors. Unfortunately my day was very windy and I only landed 2 bones. Had about 20 shots at them. Was a great learning experience as it takes a lot of skill spotting bones in the flats. Was pricey though. $450 for the day, plus $100 for the van ride, plus $50 tip. That was USD back 4 year ago!

You should be able to send the photo from your phone wirelessly to an email address or another phone. Depends on the type of phone you have and which wireless provider you use.

I fished all three of those lakes last year in August. Not a touch. I was using a deep trolling weight and my favourite Algonquin spoon which runs at about 35 feet. I distinctly remember paddling all of Little Trout while my GF took a snooze. I had my graph on and marked nothing. We camped at the west end of Butt/Ralph Bice and we both vertically jigged with spoons in the narrowing drop-off that went into about 45-80feet of water. Again, no marks and no bites. A week later we did very well in other lakes more in the central portion of the Park. Nonetheless, as mentioned previously the weather's been cool and water temps should be colder than normal so evenings and mornings you may see trout feeding closer to the surface, especially the specks. All those lakes have plenty of trout so be persistent and you'll do okay. Good luck.

For $2.50/month why is everyone complaining? If you watch one or two shows a month it's worth your money. I watch all the fly fishing shows. They're great and you can't see them on any other channel. Why the reruns and infomercials? IT'S A BUSINESS. They have to fill the time and try and generate revenues. The channel is relative new and doesn't have a lot of subscribers. Without subscribers they can't attract advertisers. Instead they're left scrapping the bottom of the bucket for folks who will pay to advertise. WFN hardly fills any commercial slots. That's why you see so much self-promotion. They can't find anyone! Hopefully as subscriber numbers grow, and the economy improves, more advertisers will recognize the value of this advertising venue and pay for commercial slots. It's the typical cable model. Revenues from subscribers and advertisers. More so the later. If this channel doesn't make a profit eventually it will be shut down. That's what's happening currently with the Super Channel. If you want original programming with no reruns you're not realistic. Smalliefisher. Great ideas but they cost money. Money they probably can't afford nor justify. Get the subs up and advertisers on board and then the new programming will come.

The economy looks to be turning around a little bit. I'd actively search for other opportunities. Stress and aggravation aren't worth it. Plus, who will hire you in the future with him as a reference if everyone knows he's an idiot?

Haha. Gotta love those EGBs. Certain conditions they just outperform everything else. Be sure to drop by the outfitter on Lake O as they carry the 'special' size EGB. The special size is key on certain lakes in the Park. Ironically I know some of the Park Staff and they can't catch a fish for their life on an EGB. Too funny. I missed my annual Algonquin trip this year, but for the past few years we've been experimenting with an assortment of spoons, hardbaits, plastics and flies. Certain conditions lend themselves to each particular lure...however, all said EGBs tend to do very well. Man are they EXPENSIVE! Thankfully I got about 50 a few years ago, all brand-new, on EBay for $45! What a steal. Thanks for the pics. I've paddled that area several times and always do well on the specks and lakers. p.s. I know Algonquin lakers are on the thinner side but it looks like this past winter was pretty rough on some of them. they look pretty skinny.

I hope you kept those fish, because you're not holding them in a catch and release friendly manner. Ouch...

It really depends on the size of flies and size of fish you're targeting. I have every weight from 0 to 9. Lightest I can get away with to fish bass size poppers would be a 6 weight. For stripping streamers and nymphing on the Grand tailwaters I use a fast action 4wt. For normal dry fly fishing on the same stretch I use a 3 wt (I'll use the zero if there's no wind and flies smaller than 18). For steelhead, 7wt or spey. If you can only have one rod go with a 5 weight. Then your second rod would be an 8 for larger species. However, if you plan on only fishing smaller fish I'd suggest a 4 weight. As far as rods go it's personal choice on rod action (fast, vs. med/fast, vs. med vs. slow). I started off with fast rods, and still use them for salt, but now prefer med/fast rods as my stroke is slower since I started spey casting with a certain brand and style of cast. I completely disagree that any rod is okay. Rod prices vary considerably, and in general, the nicer smoother casting rods cost much more. If you're looking for value there are some very nice Korean made rods for relatively cheap price in comparison to the Sages, Loomis, Scotts, etc. of the world. Line is also very important and needs to be matched to the rod and style of casting. For small fish the reel, arguably, is just for holding line. When you get into steel and salt a drag is more important. Nonetheless, a nice reel is fitting for a nice rod. Welcome to the world of fly fishing. Rover

Are you actually 'smoking' those fillets are simply slow cooking them? I'm no expert but you need wood chips and smoke to actually smoke fish. I smoke fish a couple of times a year. Most recently a couple of whities from Simcoe. Started it off on my BBQ/smoker with about 4 hours of slow smoking with soaked maple chips. It creates a lot of smoke. WAY too much to be done inside. The meat was still a bit moist so I finished it off in the oven with the door open at 200F. Regardless, if it tasted good then that's all the matters. However, the smokey flavour is best with real smoke. Alternatively if you don't have a smoker and just use the oven, try a marinade with liquid smoke in it. I've done that with beef jerky. Turns out great.

Harry's in Keswick has small minnows. I dropped in there on Thursday.

I have 6,7,8 and 9 weight single hand fly rods. For smallish, wide-open rivers, such as the Bighead I prefer to use my 7wt. I can cast pretty much any set-up from sink tips to indi-fishing. Granted it's a fast action 7wt 9' rod (Scott S3). My buddy sometimes goes down to a 6wt. IMHO an 8 wt is overkill for smaller streams. If you're worried about turnover for indi-fishing, then you can overline your 7wt with an 8wt line if you're not casting too far. Having said all that I much prefer to use a spey rod on larger rivers. For me a 7/8 Skagit set-up is ideal. I can chuck anything with that, short of a rubber boot. I don't fish the Bayfield and Maitland but I've heard from other spey guys that the two-hander is the way to go. I fish mostly the Notty and nothing beats a spey cast in tight steep tree lined banks. Single hand rods are pretty much useless in such conditions. Never mind the fact that spey casting is a 1000X more efficient than a single hand rod overhead cast.

While I understand your thrill of landing fish on light line I just wanted to reiterate that one should always use the heaviest line possible to land the fish as fast as possible so as to minimize stress on the fish. I'm not sure if everyone takes this into consideration. I know you have to go superlight to get finicky fish, but whenever possible go with the heaviest line that still enables hook-ups. This is especially important for fish such as resident trout during the warm water months of July and August (e.g. Grand River). As well, fighting a post-spawn (or pre-spawn) rainbow for greater than 10 minutes ain't cool in my books. Nice carp! Tight-lines, Rover

I've been to Laveille about 4 or 5 times. Latest was last May. I'll echo other people's comments. You'll do fine in early June. My paddling partner went in there early June about 5 years ago and did exceptionally well on the specks. He got his PB there as well at over 5lbs. The didn't get one laker. It will all depend on surface temps. According to the MNR biologist I bumped into on Dickson he said as soon as the temps hit 13C (55F) the lakers head straight to the bottom. But again, they do come up in the morning and evenings. Watch for surface activity. I've seen some awesome displays of minnow schooling by very aggressive lakers. Another alternative to wireline is lead-core. I know the local guys at Algonquin Outfitters use lead-core and a particular spoon religously and do quite well all summer. Last year on Big Trout I vertically jigged with some ice fishing spoons and did well on the lakers. I'm guessing I was in 80 feet of water and jigging near bottom (no graph with me). Other places to try are the Crow river. Bring a fly rod as it can have some great dry fly action. Lastly, I can't emphasize enough that Laveille is a big lake and blows up quickly. Be careful. Bring tons of bug dope or wear bug jackets and have a bug shelter. Good luck, Rover